


Finding Idan, Part 2

by Lumielles



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: F/M, Father-Daughter Relationship, Force Bond (Star Wars), Gen, Pregnancy, gotta find Dad, theron's still a traitor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 01:02:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14249700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lumielles/pseuds/Lumielles
Summary: Aramys tells Jace Malcom he's going to be a grandfather, and asks him for help to find her own father, Idan.  Pre-5.9 Update.





	Finding Idan, Part 2

            As their briefing was coming to a close, Lana’s monologue coming to its eventual end, Aramys glanced over the holotable to Jace Malcom.  She had lured him here with the promise of sharing any information she had on his wayward son.  It would have been rude to tell him he was going to be a grandfather over a holo.  From what little Theron had told her about Jace’s attempts to connect, Aramys knew that this kind of thing would be important to him.  She also had a favor to ask of him, at the behest of her mother.

            Jace would have to be blind to not have noticed her condition months ago.  She was a small woman, and clearly Shan’s had a knack for being large babies.  Hiding the pregnancy hadn’t been something Aramys thought to be necessary.  Though, now she wished she had considered it further. With all the rumors swirling about on the holonet as to who the father of Commander Lumielle’s baby was, it had brought her more attention than she wanted.  Malcom had never mentioned it, nor had she.  It wasn’t a conversation she was looking forward to having. 

            Everyone began to scatter as Lana’s briefing came to an unenlightening end.  They still had no idea where Theron was, and there was no new information on his location since Copero.

            There had been so many scenarios Aramys had come with regarding this moment.  She had planned every word meticulously, every hand gesture, every expression.  Making her way around the holotable toward Malcom, she realized she couldn’t remember any of it.  The only idea in her head was walking up to him, pointing at her belly, and saying ‘Guess what?’.  There had to be something better than that, that idea was awful.  Though, she realized with a quick smile, it would be something Theron would do.

           

            But Theron wasn’t here.  She was.

 

            “Thirty-three weeks,” Aramys said, leaning against the table as she came to stand beside Malcom.  “It’s Theron’s.”

            Saying it so bluntly felt strange.  People usually didn’t have to awkwardly tiptoe around this situation, telling your family was supposed to be the fun part.  Never in her life had she expected to hate being pregnant so much.  Doing it alone.  Not having any of the ‘fun parts’.  Lana and her other had tried to throw her a small baby shower, but it was only a bandage on a gaping wound of a problem.

            “I assumed he was, but I didn’t know how to—” Jace began.

            “You’d think it’d be obvious, but there are people on this base putting money down on the rumor that it’s Arcann’s.”

            Jace snapped his eyes back to her, a mix of amusement and concern in his expression.

            “Let me assure you, Theron is the only man it could possibly be,” Aramys shook her head, dismissing it.

            “Thank you for telling me, Commander.”

            “Please, call me Aramys.” She smiled up at him, “We are nearly family after all.”

            Both of them looked down at her stomach.

            “Oof,” Aramys exhaled, bringing a hand to her belly.  Using the table’s edge for support, she leaned forward.

            “You all right?” Jace asked, putting a hand on her arm.

            “Fine, just—” she took another breath, “—She just knocked the wind out of me.”

            “It’s a girl, then?” Jace asked.  As Aramys stood straight, she saw a familiar look on Jace’s face.  Theron was there, in the way his brow furrowed, how his lips parted just a little.  She inhaled, burying the sudden urge to cry.

            “Do you want to feel her?” Aramys offered, “She’s performing a legendary acrobatic routine right now.”

            “Can I?” Jace lit up, his widening grin putting her at ease.  Aramys nodded, straightening her shoulders.  She was aware she was a short woman, but as Jace leaned closer to touch her, she felt microscopic.

            “She’s right over here,” Aramys guided his hand to the left side of her belly, where a tiny foot raged battle with her internal organs.

            Whether Theron returned to her or not, Jace was family now.  There was a familiar hollowness in her heart as she thought about her own father, how he would have had the same wondrous look on his face.

            More than anything she wanted to believe her mother’s claims that Idan Lumielle was still alive, somewhere.  The last anyone had heard, the Star Destroyer Avarice had been attacked and destroyed by the Republic fifteen years ago; three years before she stepped foot on Korriban.  With an infinite amount of questions, and no idea where to begin, someone inside the Republic could be the answer they were looking for.  And she had told her mother last week that she’d ask Malcom for help.  It was why she had asked him to come, and now was her chance.

            “Quite the little spitfire, isn’t she?” Jace laughed, removing his hand.

            “Yes, she is.” _Like her father_ , Aramys thought to herself.  She cleared her throat, forcing those thoughts back down to be dealt with at another time.  “Can I ask you a question?”

            “Anything,” Jace nodded.

            “It’s about a ship—it was captured by the Republic fifteen years ago,” Aramys swallowed, trying to relieve the lump forming in her throat.  Jace stayed quiet, his jaw working the same way Theron’s did when he was thinking.

            “I’m worried I won’t be much help, fifteen years is—”

            “I know,” Aramys cut him off, trying not to sound as desperate as she felt.  “I just want to know if someone survived it, if anyone was taken prisoner.  My—my father was on the Avarice when it was attacked…  Idan Lumielle.”

            With an unreadable expression, he watched her.  Worried she had overstepped the invisible boundary of their newfound alliance, she held his stare.  As nervous as she was, she found the strength to hold herself together.  Maybe he wasn’t able to share such information, or perhaps he just didn’t want to share it with her.  An ex-Imperial trying to find another Imperial.  She knew her previous allegiance was a sore subject, Theron had told her it was one of the many topics of his last argument with his father.  Before they stopped talking.  Even though she was imprisoned in carbonite at the time, she couldn’t help but feel partially responsible for their ultimate falling out.

            Taking a deep breath and holding it, she urged herself to calm down.  She was getting too worked up and he hadn’t even spoken yet.

            “I don’t know that kind of information off the top of my,” Jace finally said, scratching the back of his neck with a large hand.  “But when I get back to Coruscant, I’ll see if I can dig up anything.”

            “I—” Aramys exhaled, “Thank you.”

            “Anything for family,” Jace shot her a grin.  It fell as she stared back at him and an exhausted sob escaped her, followed by a mix of laughter and crying.

            “Oh, uh…” Jace stiffened, sure of how to handle the confusing blend of emotions.

            “Is everything alright?” Lana said, crossing the room back to them.

            “I— “Aramys sniffled, soothing both the laughter and tears. “I—Don’t know?”

            “Did I say something wrong, Commander?” Jace asked.

            “No, not at all,” Aramys assured him, “Just hormones—cause I’m—I’m _pregnant_ ,” she broke into laughter again.

            “I think it’s time you rest, don’t you?”  Lana took her hand and started to lead her away.  Aramys allowed herself to be pulled behind her friend as she nodded an unspoken goodbye to Malcom, who offered a simple nod in response.

            “If I find anything, I’ll let you know,” he said.

            “Thank you,” Aramys said between laughs as Lana pulled her toward her quarters.  The laughter had died by the time her door closed behind them.

            “Malcom’s going to think you’re insane,” Lana repressed a smile.

            “I’m starting to wonder myself,” Aramys grumbled as she slowly lowered herself onto the couch.  “I cannot wait for this to be over.”

            “You might think otherwise after a few sleepless nights with a newborn,” Lana settled beside her.

            “It’s like I don’t even know how to sit anymore, every way is unbearable.”

            After a bit of fumbling with a throw pillow that she’d shoved between her back and the couch, she stopped fidgeting.

            “You look like you can barely breathe,”

            “I can’t.”

            Lana took a pause, studying her closest friend.   Already she had seen the change that motherhood, or expectant motherhood, had left on Aramys.  Just the other day she’d found her obsessively trying to find a place for the bassinette she got gotten during a trip to Zakuul.  First, she put it by the bed, then across the room, then by the sofa, then back beside the bed.  Lana agreed with her that near the bed was probably the best place for it.

            “Is there a reason you’re staring at me?” Aramys asked, her silvery voice so familiar to Lana that it was oddly comforting.

            “What does it feel like?” Lana asked.  Aramys was going through one of the largest changes a woman could go through, on she wasn’t sure she’d ever go through herself.  Not that she hadn’t thought about it, but there has never been a moment in Lana’s life where it was an option.

            “Hm?”

            “Being pregnant, how does it feel?”

            “Bizarre,” Aramys said after thinking, clearing her throat as she straightened the black undershirt she wore under her jacket.  She mindlessly trailed a finger down the middle of her belly. “I don’t know what I ever expected it to feel like, but…  I think I’ll miss her once she blasts out of me.”

            “ _Blasts_ out of you?” Lana repeated with a laugh.

            “If she’s anything like her father she’ll— “Aramys stopped.  “She won’t be able to wait to leave me too.”

            “Aramys,” Lana sighed, scooting closer to her.

            “You know what’s funny, is that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this weird pickled fish I once had as a child.” Aramys forced a smile, changing the subject.

            “I never met a child who enjoyed pickled fish.”

            “Oh, I hated it the moment it touched my lips, I refused to eat it.” Aramys shook her head, making a disgusted face.  “But honestly, I can’t stop thinking about it.”

            “Aramys.”

            “Yes?”  
            “Are you asking me to find you pickled fish?”

            “I… am.  Yes.” Aramys gave her best sympathetic smile.

            “I’ll see what I can do.”

 

* * *

 

            In the heart of the Republic, a man sat in a prison cell.  He was a political prisoner, filed away to one day be used as a bargaining chip or blackmail material.  He’d been betrayed by the Order that had forced his hand, abandoned by those he trusted. Forced to rot away in solitary confinement for nothing more than a blood relation.

            Black hair had faded to a dark shade of gray, silver peppered at his temples.  Pallid skin that hadn’t seen the sun in seven years clung to a boney frame, sunken and dark around tired brown eyes.

            He had been something, even if it was for a brief period of his life.  The Jedi had let him be something, someone who mattered.  He had earned the title of Barsen’thor.  Only to have it undeservedly ripped away because of the only person he loved more than anything.  A person he thought to be dead.

            His daughter, Aramys, was the only thing that had kept him going during the first few years of his imprisonment.  She had been alive, and she somehow managed to climb her way up the Imperial ladder to sit on the Dark Council.  He’d been told she’d been killed by a guard shortly after Darth Marr’s ship had been destroyed.  He could have been lying, Idan hoped he was, because he would have felt her death like he’d felt Brevom’s.

            It had been a long time since he’d spoken to anyone, sometimes he’d go weeks without speaking at all.  He’d talk to himself every once in a while, just to make sure his voice still worked.  These days, he spent his time meditating, finding it easier to do now that he had nothing else to occupy his time.  He used it more as an escape than a tool to focus himself.   Every day he tried to use the force to reach out to her or her mother.  The prison was too populated for him to feel anything outside of it.  Not to mention he was also on the most populated planet in Republic space.

            He couldn’t sense anything, except the guard coming to stop outside his cell.

            “Have you come to see the fallen Jedi?” Idan growled, his eyes still closed.  As far as they were concerned, he was just a disgraced Jedi accused of treason.  Selling secrets to the Empire was what was in his file.  It was believable.  He was once and Imperial citizen, though ‘citizen’ was stretching it.  His accent was something he had been careful to keep, refusing to allow the Republic to take anything else from him.  An obvious brogue, courtesy of his slave origins, usually garnered nervous glances.  It made it easy to pin him as a traitor.

            “Not today, you’re out.” The female guard said, as the energy barrier locking him in powered down.

            “I’m sorry?” Idan said, eyes opening.  He stayed seated on the floor, unsure if he had heard her correctly.

            “You’re out, let’s go,” she motioned with her arms, ushering him to leave the cell.

            “Out? Are you sure?”

            “Idan Lumielle?” she said, annoyed by the delay.

            “Unfortunately.”

            “Supreme Commander Malcom has ordered your release.”

            Maybe they were finally letting him, to rejoin the Jedi.  Not that he’d take them up on the offer.  He had no want to go back to them.  The majority of the Council had turned on him so quickly, he was still dealing with the shock of it.  Grand Master Shan had claimed it was out of her hands, it was Supreme Chancellor Saresh’s order.  It had been Satele who had made the connection between him and Darth Imperius, after working with her during the Yavin coalition. 

            Idan no longer trusted her or her Jedi.

 

* * *

 

 

            Having dragged a chair all the way from her quarters to the war room, Aramys sat with a datapad balancing haphazardly on her stomach.  Feet propped up on the holotable, she sunk deeper into the chain.  Lana had told her to go rest, that she shouldn’t be on her feet so much.  This was her compromise.

            “This is not what she meant, and you know it.”  Lana frowned, crossing her arms over her chest as she stared down at her.

            “I don’t want to sulk in my quarters,” Aramys waved a limp hand at her.

            “I didn’t want you to go sulk, I wanted you to go rest.  You’ve been up almost an entire day.”

            “I can’t rest, I’m too worked up.”

            “About what?”

            “I don’t know, I just feel like something is going to happen today.  Something about Theron, maybe.”

            “You’re almost thirty-five weeks pregnant, you need sleep while you can still get it.”

            “I will, I just—”

            “Commander,” interrupted a low gravelly voice behind them.

            “Arcann, tell her she needs to go to sleep.  Maybe she’ll listen to you.” Lana sighed in frustration.

            “Why would I possibly listen to him more than you?” Aramys retorted.

            “You should rest.” Arcann agreed.

            “I don’t need—” Aramys stopped speaking, her eyes going wide.

            “What is it?” Lana asked worriedly.

            “I know what’s going to happen today,” Aramys said, monotone.  She gritted her teeth as she felt what she believed to be her first contraction.

            “Oh, are you serious?” Lana said,

            “Do not tell me this is my fault, I don’t think nap would’ve deterred this,” Aramys stood.

            “Where are you going?” Lana asked, following her.

            “The medbay?” Aramys looked at her incredulously.

            “Wait, I’ll come with you.” Lana took several long strides to catch up.  “Arcann, can you find Petra, tell her where we are?”

            “Of course,” Arcann nodded.  “Good luck, Commander.”

            “Oh, uh, thank you.” She said, waddling toward the lift.

            “Wait, Commander—Aramys!” Arcann called.

            “Yes?”

            “Supreme Commander Malcom wanted to speak with you, apparently he’s on his way here.”

            “Here?” Aramys asked, “Are you sure?”

            “Yes, he’s expected to arrive within a few hours.”

            “He has impressive timing,” Lana said under her breath.

            “Family trait, apparently.” Aramys snorted.

 

* * *

 

            It was another day stuck in his shuttle.  Nothing better to do than wait for the next move.  Days where he had nothing but himself always dragged on longer than usual.  He was bored, and he was having a hard time keeping himself distracted.

            Theron yawned, rubbing his eyes.  He was forcing himself to stay awake as long as he could.  When he slept, he dreamt; his dreams were always about Aramys.  The woman he left behind. The _pregnant_ woman he left behind.

            With a growl, he grabbed his cup of caf, half full and gone cold.  He downed the rest of it, not caring about the temperature.  Still, he felt himself nod off the moment he leaned back in the cockpit chair.

            The second his eyes shut, he saw the ceiling of the medbay on Odessen, as if he was on his back.  His chest felt tight and he heard Lana’s voice call out for Aramys.

            His eyes shot open as a distant cry of pain filled his senses.  It wasn’t something he heard, it wasn’t an audible sound.  It was feeling, he could feel Aramys crying out.  It was crystal clear all the same.

            “That’s… just great.” He grumbled to himself. 


End file.
